itel brings Smart TV to the masses through innovative NetRange VISNOS Cloud Platform

The collaboration brings Smart TVs to territories including India, Vietnam, Pakistan and throughout Africa with free access to premium content included, making OTT in the home affordable to many viewers for the first time

Hamburg, Germany and Shenzhen, PRC(03 Dec 2020)

NetRange MMH GmbH (‘NetRange’), the global provider of white-labelled, turnkey Smart TV and OTT ecosystems, and itel, the global mobile phone brand, today announced that the NetRange VISNOS Smart TV app portal has been selected for itel’s new Smart TV range.

NetRange VISNOS is an innovative client-based solution that moves functionality to the cloud enabling an advanced Smart TV experience to be accessed and enjoyed by consumers with low end/ low CPU-powered digital and advanced televisions (DTV/ ATV) that wouldn’t otherwise be able to access connected services. VISNOS utilises the power of the cloud to enable Smart TV at a significantly reduced bill of materials (BOM) cost to the manufacturer and without the need to integrate a browser, making Smart TVs affordable to many viewers for the first time.

“itel’s new Smart TV range is exciting news for viewers who will be able to access a whole range of new content in a budget-friendly way,” says Frank Gao, Director of Contents and IOT Dept., itel. “With a footprint in India, Vietnam and many other territories in the APAC and African regions, itel’s new Smart TV range powered by NetRange VISNOS has the potential to transform the viewing experience for millions of users.”

“The Smart TV market is the fastest growing segment of television but cost can be a barrier to many consumers,” says Tim Schröder, CEO, NetRange. “The partnership between NetRange VISNOS and itel successfully overcomes that challenge. Best of all, VISNOS comes pre-loaded with popular local content so viewers don’t have to take out costly ongoing subscriptions to access some of the best content apps, featuring VOD, games, sports, news and other linear channels.”

NetRange automatically provides access to localized content in each market, be it India, Vietnam or across Africa, and its partnerships cover top popular and affordable local content requests from itel customers in these countries. NetRange is partnered with many regional Local King apps, including Hungama, Eros Now, Toon Goggles and Epic TV. itel also benefits from NetRange’s local market knowledge and dedication, with daily support and rapid response from a Chinese project manager, backed up by a German R&D centre with engineers continually controlling product quality and stability.

The NetRange VISNOS platform removes the requirement for a browser in the TV, a major element of the integration effort and incremental cost for CE device manufacturers building Smart TVs for the most price-sensitive regions. VISNOS also supports the casting of YouTube from mobile devices to the TV, and NetRange will add to the services that can be cast to the TV.

Tim Schröder concluded: “NetRange’s innovative VISNOS uses the cloud to solve many of the headaches in delivering content and apps across the APAC and African regions, delivering a unique one-stop-shop for content providers and TV manufacturers and ensuring that Smart TV continues to be the fastest growing TV segment.”